


In the Grip of Her Unblinking Gaze

by fresne



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, F/F, F/M, Misses Clause Challenge, Non Consensual, Rape/Non-con References, Yuletide 2012, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-13
Updated: 2012-12-13
Packaged: 2017-11-21 00:36:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/591456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresne/pseuds/fresne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eldest of the sisters, Medusa alone stood the guardian of the Eastern gates of Sicani by the lapping sea. Euryale guarded the western gate with brazen hands and fearsome cries. Stheno, the youngest, the softest of aspect, hers was to face the mountainous north with its crags and eagles' reach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Grip of Her Unblinking Gaze

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



Eldest of the sisters, Medusa alone stood the guardian of the Eastern gates of Sicani by the lapping sea. With unblinking gaze, she watched against the rising of the sun and the tides of invaders that sought to take the wide olive groves of Sicani for themselves. Her sister, Euryale, guarded the western gate with brazen hands and fearsome cries. The people of the city stood with her there. They held their shields together as impenetrable scales under her guidance. Stheno, the youngest, the softest of aspect, hers was to face the mountainous north with its crags and eagles' reach. With her yellow wings, she often flew to perch there. The great eagles and the seahawks, they flocked to her and took the flesh of the sea from her brazen hands.

The sea that lapped upon the harbor, they did not guard against. Were they not the daughters of the chthonic sea? They were the daughters of Phycys and Ceto coiled down far into the deep. They were the daughters of wine deep darkness and salt and echoes.

Medusa was in love. 

She did not show it easily. That was not her nature. Her nature was unblinking. Her nature was the strong slide of great coils through the rolling hills bestrewn in ancient olive groves. 

In the springtime of the year, when the yellow pollen fell from the trees, she first looked out from the Eastern gate and met the gaze of grey-eyed Athena. She, the daughter of a younger god, whose father consumed her mother in a single swallow. His monstrous aspect hidden between red smacking lips and a golden beard.

Medusa, she was unafraid. She strode out from her gate. Her spear in her hand. She pushed back the frozen mask of her helm, the bronze of it an eternal scream of righteous rage. The pollen fell golden upon her face. It trembled upon her lashes. Her bronze hair tumbled free. It alone indicated the tumbled nature of her feelings in that moment. That golden hour when she first met the gaze of grey-eyed Athena, wise as a serpent and contained too in her aspect.

They gazed into each other on that morning. 

It would be imprudent to describe then what occurred between them. What happened when the eldest of the Gorgon sisters and Pallas Athena first met. It would be best to then say that Medusa opened her gates to Athena and let her into the city to dwell there. 

On the highest hill within the polis, Medusa built for Athena a temple with wide open doors. That all might come in and find wisdom.

In the temple of Athena, they were often together. Athena at her loom, as Medusa watched her clever hands at their weaving. It was their home. They met with Euryale and shared bread drizzled with olive oil. They met with Stheno and played games. 

They were in love. They pleated their fingers as one might weave the threads in a loom. They played at games together. 

It would be imprudent to say more and yet, who writes with prudence that tells the tales of gods?

The kisses of their lips were as rich and golden as an olive oil of first press. Not virgin sisters kisses these, no. Medusa was a daughter of the chthonic sea. She kissed as fiercely. Athena, whose first words were a battle cry, she gave nothing way, but willing battled for Medusa's regard. Athena was the goddess of craft and arts and skill. Her fingers were clever. She crafted such things as to give her love delight. Athena greatly loved to rest her clever head upon the wild bronze masses of Medusa's hair and speak the names of clouds as they lay upon the flat roof of the temple. Medusa greatly loved to pay tribute to Athena and hold her tightly wrapped in her coils. They delighted in each other. 

They were in love. 

The lapping sea brushed against the sea steps that led down into the water. It was summer and all was blessed in the world. The olives grew round and ripe in the ancient olive groves that stretched into the rolling hills of the East.

In autumn of the year, the people of Sicani plucked the olives and took in the harvest. They fortified the walls of their homes. They painted the doors blue against the winter winds.

The lapping sea surged in its tides against the port of Sicani. It rose and fell. The boats of the fishermen rose and fell with it.

The wintertime came. With it the storms of grey skies and rain. In sorrowing aspect, Athena left for a journey to spend the shortest days with her father on high Olympus. That there might be some wisdom there.

They parted with sorrowing hearts and hopeful fingers. 

Medusa was unafraid. Stheno mourned the loss of long days of flying in blue skies. Euryale used this time in training with the people. But Medusa reveled in the rain. She walked down the sea steps and she swam in the sea. Was it not her mother? Was it not her father?

Alas, Medusa had forgotten it was no longer chthonic days. There then her crime. To forget and for an instant close her eyes against the salt of the sea.

For in that winter storm, Poseidon looked upon her with her clouds of bronze hair floating in the fierce waves and found her beautiful. As she slithered back up onto the sea steps, he called to her and offered all the bounty of the sea if she would lie with him, but once. Her aspect was unchanged. She looked at him with unblinking blue-green eyes and picked up her spear in answer.

She forgot. What is a spear against the sea?

The waves roared. They crashed upon the harbor. There was no sea wall. The waves rushed past. They flooded the streets. Salt water poured past the doors painted blue. Whole families drowned. Grandmothers clutching at the plump legs of the babe just born. Euryale did what she could. She gathered her soldiers and led the people to the higher ground. Stheno battered as well she could against the wind and led them to the high passes in the mountains.

Medusa, she remained. She alone was the guardian of the Eastern gates.

But this was the sea. She fell back higher and higher within the emptied city. Poseidon pursued her. She cast her spear and the waves parted before it. She climbed the steps to the temple of Athena. She went into the temple with wide open doors that all might come in and find wisdom there.

It would be cruel to speak of what occurred there on the floor of the temple of Athena. What occurred on the marble that Medusa herself had carved for her love. The sea desired. The sea took. When the waters finally receded, buildings had been thrown from their moorings. Ships lay tilted upon the flat roofs where the people had gathered in halcyon days.

And the dead. There were so many dead. 

Medusa screamed. She was rage personified. 

She thrashed with her coils. She did as much damage then as the sea had done. Her screams were unending. She wrent the sky with them.

In the mountains above, Euryale wept. Stheno hid her face behind her wings. The Sicani cried out in fear. 

The sisters parted from them then. They went to their sister, but Medusa could not be comforted. 

Athena returned. 

Tears poured down her stalwart cheeks. But Athena could only be the goddess that she was. She spoke of temperance and strategy and appeals to the law of Olympus. The blue-green gaze of Medusa met grey-eyed Athena then. She asked then what of the law for Metis? What of Athena's mother, consumed by her father, the young king of the gods. This was the rule of law. She did not say these words. She shouted them as she crashed her mighty coils. Athena gave her then the only comfort that she could.

Medusa's aspect, she changed to the face of her bronze helm. An eternal scream that her voice might rest. Her bronze curls that she had so loved, that had so drawn the sea lapping softly at the sea steps, she transformed into venomous serpents that none might trifle with her again. Her eyes, the eyes of the daughter of a chthonic sea, she made as stone and to look them was to become stone. Even the sea. Even the ever changing sea would be stone were it to look therein.

She might have then have waited. But for all her wisdom, Athena was a child of a younger god. Medusa bid her leave and Athena left. Her love grew gravid with the children the sea had forced upon her that day. She would not let fall from her body. She kept them inside herself. She ripped up the ancient olive groves. She destroyed the temple. She destroyed the city. Until even Euryale and Stheno were forced to make way from the city that was polis no more. Only the dead lived there. 

Only statues of heroes that sought to slay the monster that dwelt there. They wanted the treasure of Siciani. The golden casks of olive oil transmuted by time and legend into boxes of gold. 

There was no treasure. The olive oil had long since gone rancid on the touch of the sea.

Athena in time grew wiser then. It is not prudent to speak of the gods being unwise. But even the most clever can grow in wisdom. What were the thoughts of the goddess of craft and skill and defense when she sent Perseus with a shield as bright as a mirror to her love? It cannot be known.

But thereafter upon the shield of grey-eyed Athena, wise as a serpent, she bore the face of Medusa in her eternal rage. A goddess of wisdom may not be inclined to forgetfulness. She may also consider that in the end, even gods may die and the sea may turn to stone.


End file.
